Reported by Dan Barry, Daniel J. Wakin and Elissa Gootman and written
by Mr. Barry
New York Times
February 20, 2003

Although his name never appears in the recent Suffolk County grand jury
report on sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests on Long Island, Msgr.
Alan J. Placa acknowledges that he emerges as a central villain. Not only
does the report suggest that he is the imperious architect of policies
that protected pedophiles, but it says that three decades ago he groped
teenage boys through their clothes and made "feeble attempts"
to grope an altar server.

Before the sexual abuse scandal spread to the Long Island diocese last
year, Monsignor Placa was best known as the high-ranking adviser in the
Diocese of Rockville Centre; the close friend of former Mayor Rudolph
W. Giuliani; the gifted homilist who struck some as brilliant and others
as clinically detached, even arrogant. Now he is portrayed as the dark
figure, "Priest F," in the angels-and-devils story laid out
in 180 pages by last week's grand jury report.

"I'm not even a human being," he said during an interview last
week at the Midtown office of Giuliani Partners, where he works as a consultant.
"I'm a monster."

Monsignor Placa was not among the 97 witnesses to testify before the
grand jury during its eight-month inquiry. Robert Clifford, a spokesman
for the Suffolk County district attorney's office, declined yesterday
to discuss who had been subpoenaed and who had not.

But if the monsignor had testified -- and he would have, he says -- the
grand jury would have seen a 58-year-old man with a meticulously groomed
beard and mustache, whose pale face flushes at the thought of his precipitous
fall. A year ago he was the bishop's representative on extremely delicate
matters, conducting the diocesan equivalent of internal affairs investigations.
Now he is on administrative leave, pending the outcome of the diocese's
inquiry into the abuse allegations. For now, he is prohibited from celebrating
Mass in public and wearing clerical garb without permission from the bishop.

With alternate flashes of erudition and impatience, Monsignor Placa emphatically
denied virtually everything said about him in the report -- especially
the declaration that he abused minors -- and frequently played down his
influence within the diocese.

For years his reputation within the diocese was that of "a heartless
persecutor of priests," he said. "And now, in fact, to be told
that I was not a protector, but a predator. That I was a predator because
of the preposterous allegations of abuse lodged against me personally,
and that I was the architect of a policy whose purpose was to deprive
people of their rights and to protect sexual ---- that's heartbreaking."

The subject of Monsignor Placa generates strong emotions, pro and con.
"I would trust him to handle anything with judgment and good taste
and to always do the right thing," said Peter Powers, a former deputy
mayor to Mr. Giuliani who has known Monsignor Placa since high school.
But Robert Fulton, who was the diocese's director of priest health services
before leaving the priesthood, said: "Placa tried to handle this
all to the law of Placa. People didn't trust him; he's a snake."

To make sense of the wrenching crisis at the Diocese of Rockville Centre,
one first has to make sense of Monsignor Placa.

Alan Placa attended Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School in Brooklyn,
where he began lifelong friendships with Mr. Giuliani and Mr. Powers.
The three men have often reminisced about attending opera performances,
and staying up late to talk about politics, theology and poetry.

The three friends also attended Manhattan College together. Mr. Giuliani
said later that he and Alan Placa had considered earning doctoral degrees
and becoming "practicing philosophers," earning a living by
"just sitting somewhere, developing ideas and thoughts." Instead,
Rudy Giuliani and Peter Powers went on to law school, and Alan Placa went
on to the seminary.

Alan Placa was ordained a priest in May 1970, and assigned as an associate
pastor at St. Patrick's parish in Glen Cove. Then, from 1974 to 1978,
he was the dean of students at St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary, a high
school in Uniondale. He worked for Catholic Charities, graduated from
Hofstra University School of Law and, before long, became the diocese's
point man under Bishop John R. McGann on the occasional allegation of
abuse involving a minor.

"We'd often observe that they'd come in clumps," he said. "We'd
get two or three in the space of a month, and then we wouldn't hear anything
for months."

He cast himself as an expert on clerical sexual abuse, helping the diocese
devise legal policies and consulting on cases around the country. In 1990,
he contributed an essay to a book called "Slayer of the Soul: Child
Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church," in which he emphasized that
a diocese must first treat victims compassionately -- although, he added,
"as a lawyer I am not ashamed to admit that I have a concern for
protecting the assets of the church."

In his essay, he warned that a mere accusation can cause lasting damage
to a priest. He also suggested that an abusive priest can return to ministry
after extensive, effective treatment, but only under supervision and with
no contact with minors. He reiterated that position during last week's
interview; he said that the "zero tolerance" policy adopted
last year by American bishops -- in which priests found guilty of a single
sexual offense are automatically removed from ministry -- was immoral
and "un-Christian."

The Rev. Stephen J. Rossetti, a psychologist who edited the book, said
that Monsignor Placa was among the first priests to focus on clerical
sexual abuse. "Before everyone casts him in the role of being a bad
guy, Al is one of the pioneers who tried to help the church," said
Father Rossetti, the president of the St. Luke Institute in Silver Spring,
Md., where priests accused of sexual abuse were sometimes sent for evaluation.

But the grand jury report portrays Monsignor Placa as a central figure
in a conspiracy of decades within the Diocese of Rockville Centre to save
face and money -- by shuffling abusive priests from parish to parish and
by using an "intervention team" to trick victims into silence
and to quash legal claims. He was arrogant and cold, it said, so much
so that a nun once called him a bastard. And, when interviewing alleged
victims, he purposely disguised the fact that he was a diocesan lawyer
as well as a priest.

To support these impressions, the report quotes from several of the monsignor's
memorandums. In June 1993, for example, he instructed colleagues not to
identify him as a lawyer when referring abuse cases to him, in part because
he served as an administrator in such cases. "My legal training is
very useful in helping to gather and analyze facts," he wrote, "and
in helping us to avoid some obvious pitfalls, but we must avoid 'frightening'
people."

Over the last year, several victims and their relatives have complained
about Monsignor Placa's manner. Kathy Lotten, whose son was abused as
a teenager by a priest in Kings Park in the late 1970's, called the diocese
in 1993 after learning that the priest had been appointed pastor at another
parish. She said that Monsignor Placa was "kind of oily."

"He was very articulate and used a lot of big words, which I felt
was to intimidate me," Mrs. Lotten said. "One in particular
I remember was, if this priest is guilty he's guilty of ephebophilia"
-- the abuse of an adolescent, not a child. "He said, 'Are you aware
that the statute is way out,' or something along those lines, and I can't
sue."

"I wouldn't swear to it, but I do not remember him saying that he
was an attorney," she said. "If he was there as an attorney,
then I should have had an attorney."

Monsignor Placa dismissed the controversy over his priest-lawyer role
as a "red herring." He said that if he had identified himself
as a lawyer, people might have mistakenly thought that he handled litigation
on abuse cases, which he did not. Besides, he said, "the vast majority
of cases, 95 percent of the cases, were outside the statute of limitations."

"Everyone came to me because I was the bishop's representative,"
he said, his voice rising in disbelief. "They knew that. Not only
did they know it -- it wasn't something that was slipped over on them
-- it's what they asked for."

He also said: "If I had identified myself as a lawyer, what would
they have done differently? Not told me their troubles?"

The monsignor said the report left the impression that he was omnipotent
within the church. This impression was bolstered by the central role he
played in the annulment of Mr. Giuliani's first marriage to his second
cousin in the early 1980's.

The monsignor said that perception of power was overblown. He said he
played no role in reassigning priests and rarely kept track of an accused
priest once he had completed the evaluation. In fact, he said, the diocese
sometimes ignored his advice to have all accused priests evaluated at
facilities with no connection to the church.

He oversaw health care for the diocese, he said, and, as a member of
its intervention team, conducted the initial investigation of most of
the allegations of abuse by priests. He said that in every case, he offered
to arrange counseling for the alleged victims -- whether he believed they
were telling the truth or not -- and that in every case, "the priest
was immediately removed from his assignment" for evaluation.

He said that many priests despised him as a result, but that he had no
choice. If an alleged victim came forward to say that the claim had been
made up, then Monsignor Placa said that he would apologize to the priest,
and ask for the priest's forgiveness.

"However, suppose you try the other direction," he said. "I
come to you, I say this kid says you did this. You say, 'I did not,' and
I say, 'I believe you.' And two weeks later you molest another child.
Who the hell is going to go to that kid and say, 'I'm sorry'?"

Monsignor Placa said that the diocese did make mistakes, but he categorized
them as being in the "If I knew then what I know now" vein.
He maintained, for example, that the model he developed for responding
to allegations of abuse -- the three-priest "intervention team"
-- was sound, and saw no difference in the model now used by the bishop
of Rockville Center, William Murphy: a three-member team that includes
a priest, a nun and a former police chief.

"The model is skills sets: legal, clinical and church administrative,"
he said. "I don't think there's any difference at all, unless you
assume that priests are untrustworthy." Then he added that having
a woman on the panel "enriches the way that model works."

When asked to cite one mistake that he personally made, he began by again
saying, "If I knew then what I know now." He remembered a complaint
about a priest who frequently invited children to listen to music in his
room in the rectory. Monsignor Placa interviewed the children and the
priest, and determined that nothing untoward was happening, although,
he said, he told the priest and his pastor that these get-togethers were
not "wise."

"As a matter of fact, I now find out that he was in fact apparently
sexually abusing kids," he said.

Monsignor Placa is not named in the grand jury report. Mr. Clifford said
the district attorney's office believed no one was identifiable, a responsibility
that he said had been "handled with care."

But general biographical details, combined with the report's statement
that Priest F was instrumental in developing the diocese's policy on abuse
allegations, clearly point to Monsignor Placa.

According to the grand jury, Monsignor Placa -- or "Priest F"
-- was guilty of the very behavior that he was trying to weed out. It
said that in the early 1970's, he demonstrated conduct that "was,
at first, so equivocal, his victims weren't really sure it was happening
to them -- that is, until it happened again and again and again."

On two occasions, the report says, Priest F "appears to have made
feeble attempts at abusing a boy who was an altar server." It adds,
"This victim came forward decades later, only after Priest F denied
sexually abusing anyone in a local newspaper story about sexually abusive
priests."

Monsignor Placa said that the first he heard of this allegation, which
dates to his years as a young priest at St. Patrick's in Glen Cove, was
"when I read the grand jury report." He denied ever trying to
grope a minor.

The grand jury report says that Priest F was then given an assignment
"that provided a large and continuous source of boys -- a school,"
a reference to St. Pius. It says that Priest F was "cautious but
relentless in pursuing his victims"; that he groped boys behind a
newspaper, book or poster; and that everyone in the school knew to stay
away from him.

Although the report is vague on how many people have accused Monsignor
Placa of groping them at St. Pius, one is clearly Richard Tollner, a 1977
graduate who is now a mortgage broker living near Albany. Mr. Tollner
has told reporters, the grand jury and diocesan officials that Monsignor
Placa repeatedly groped him. He has said that he mentioned the incidents
to a classmate, Kevin Waldron, and that he complained to a math teacher,
Angelo Scordato.

Mr. Waldron said yesterday that he specifically recalled that Mr. Tollner
had told him about the groping. But Mr. Scordato, now retired, said on
Sunday that he had no recollection of such events, and that he told Mr.
Tollner this when Mr. Tollner called him while cooperating with Newsday
last year on an article about Monsignor Placa.

"I find it incredible that I'd forget something like that -- and
I'm not senile," Mr. Scordato said. "I would have gone directly
to the rector's office. I wouldn't have tolerated that kind of nonsense."

Last spring, after Newsday reported Mr. Tollner's allegation, the Nassau
County district attorney's office notified the diocese that it was investigating
the alleged abuse, a quarter-century later. As a result, Bishop Murphy
placed Monsignor Placa on administrative leave.

Mr. Tollner said this week, "I have nothing to add to my previous
testimony, and I stand by it." Monsignor Placa said that he never
touched Mr. Tollner, whom he remembered as a "troubled boy"
who was always "singling himself out."

Monsignor Placa said that he was especially outraged to see himself included
in the "Priests as Perpetrators" section of the grand jury's
report. There are detailed allegations of abuse: of children being raped
by priests, of a minor being taken to a sex club by a priest -- and, as
the monsignor noted in a sarcastic tone, "a clumsy attempt to abuse
by touching someone's thigh."

"Give me a break!" he said. "Let me tell you something.
My hand up to God, I didn't do any of those things! But if that were true,
does that belong in there?"

Monsignor Placa has no choice but to wait for the diocese to complete
its inquiry. He said that he expects to be exonerated, which would allow
him to return to ministry. Until then, he wears a suit to the offices
of Giuliani Partners.

[Photo caption: Msgr. Alan J. Placa, in a photo he supplied through Giuliani
Partners. He is now on administrative leave from the Diocese of Rockville
Centre. (Nick Iverson)